An airport electrical power supply is coupled to an airliner parked on the ground, through an electrical cable. Prior cables required a workman to turn off power to the cable, pull the cable out to the aircraft and connect it, and then walk back to turn on power. To encourage workmen to not pull out a "hot" cable already connected to the power supply, which could cause sparks and fuel ignition during connection and disconnection, applicant has incorporated switches at the outer end of the cable. This allows workmen to control the application of electrical power from a location at the outer end of the cable.
Applicant has found that the switches at the end of the cable often require replacement. Workmen will sometimes depress a switch by poking it with a screwdriver, or deliberately allow the outer end of the cable to drop several feet onto a concrete runway, all of which can damage the switches. To facilitate switch replacement, a connection box was provided at the end of the cable, which held perhaps one-half foot of length of each cable conductor, to provide for splicing switch wires to them, and where wire-to-wire connections were made. Such connection boxes are bulky. In certain applications such as for connecting to military aircraft where the outer ends of two cables must lie closely adjacent, such connection boxes interfered with such close placement of a pair of electrical cables, and cables without switches at the end had to be used. An electrical cable of the type that connects to aircraft, which enabled switches to be incorporated at the cable end and which enabled replacement of damaged switches in a very compact arrangement which was also watertight, would be of considerable value.